lier when she starts the fire. Once the pupils
arrive, however, they do all the work. “It
brings me immense satisfaction to help
students learn by doing and then share
with them the excitement of accomplishment, or, in this case, eating what they have
cooked,” Madison says.

Parallels to modern cooking abound.

For example, cookware matters. With
hearth cooking, the key is cast iron, properly seasoned and in a variety of shapes.

Standing in front of seven closet shelves
stacked with antique and well-used pots,
pans, and kettles, Madison explains, for
example, the salient feature of a cast-iron
Dutch oven: It must have a flat lid, not the
convex shape of modern pots, so you can
heap coals on top to cook the food inside.

Some cookware is designed to be hung from
the pivoting crane attached to the hearth